Assessing And Understanding Current IS/IT Situation

1. Assessing And Understanding Current IS/IT Situation • To determine main deliverables of the business IS strategy, • existing business and IS/IT environment must be analyzed • expected future business and IS/IT environment must be analyzed • To understand the existing business and technology environment makes possible to determine the opportunities, threats and requirements inherent in business strategy and in current operations of the business.

2. Assessing And Understanding Current IS/IT Situation • It is also possible to recognize the strengths and weakness of business and its IS/IT operations. • Because the current situation represents the starting point from which any change programmes begin. • E.g. CitiBank, Akbank, Finasbank, AnadoluBank, MNGBank

3. Determining the IS/IT Requirements : The IS Demand • One way of determining the IS demand would be to ask each area of business their requirements. This would be likely to deliver a comprehensive wish list. • Another way would be to absorb every written strategy statement and interpret them into relevant IS/IT principles and application requirements.

4. Determining the IS/IT Requirements : The IS Demand • The best course for the IS strategy and its demand to be develeped in paralel with the business strategy. To determine the IS/IT requirements, it is necessary to obtain -the current situation (“where we are?”) - the desired situation(“where we want to be ?”) - the way to reach the desired situation

5. Fact Finding / Analysis of Tasks • The value of the IS/IT strategy is depend upon the depth of understanding of business and its needs and the constructive interpretation of these needs into beneficial information, system and IT services. To understand the business and its needs the following tasks need to be done.

6. Fact Finding / Analysis of Tasks Tasks Purpose & Deliverables

7. Fact Finding / Analysis of Tasks Tasks Purpose & Deliverables

8. Fact Finding / Analysis of Tasks Tasks Purpose & Deliverables

9. Fact Finding / Analysis of Tasks Tasks Purpose & Deliverables

10. Fact Finding / Analysis of Tasks Tasks Purpose & Deliverables

11. Fact Finding / Analysis of Tasks • The information needs related to the business perspective maybe internal or external. The majority of information needs are internal, generated in operational activities. Others related to the external factors are of particular in areas concerned with customer services and competitive activities.

12. Fact Finding / Analysis of Tasks • The elements of internal environment that are need to be identified, documented and understood are • -the business strategy • -the current business processes • -the organisational environment

13. Fact Finding / Analysis of Tasks • The information systems and technology needs arising from the business strategy can be determine by considering two type of activities -Activities that must be perform in order to contribute to the achivement of business objectives, such as increase market share, improve customer satisfaction, -Secondary activities that have to be performed in order to measure performance towards achieving the business objectives.

14. Fact Finding / Analysis of Tasks • The business strategy may exist in a variety of froms. It may be accessible through formally recorded documents or less formally in other documents. Some times, it can be discussed and confirmed with senior management.The main constituents of the business startegy given below.

15. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy

16. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy

17. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy

18. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy

19. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy • Another set of deliverables coming from the current situation analysis are models that depict the processes, activities…These models offer a number of benefits. -A valuable aid to understanding what is happening in an organization. -A communication vehicle -A means of reviewing the merits or faults of organizational structure -A basis for defining conceptual activities and illustrating improvement opportunities.

20. Internal Business Environment • The IS model indicates applications and their relationships. Models include following submodels. -Process Flow Models -Hierarchical Activity Models -Entity Relationship Models -Data Flow Diagrams -Activity / Entity Matrices

21. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy • IS models may be created for the whole corporate body or at strategic business units (SBUs). In a large organization with several business units, separate models should be created for each SBU. •  It is also essential to have a clear understanding of organizations current structure, relationships and the people working for the organization. The organizational dynamics form an important input into the planning process. It is necassary to understand the environment and its skills, resources, values, culture, social interactions and management style.

22. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy • External Business Environment • The forces and pressure groups acting on the organization are the major influences on the scope of the business strategy. Therefore, it is essential to understand and analyze the external environment.

23. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy • In order to assess and prioritize IS actions, it is necessary to examine the current IS/IT environment to establish the gap between current and future targeted systems. It comprises -an evaluation of current application portfolio and applications under development -an evaluation of current databases and those under construction -user’s perception of the value of the portfolio -an evaluation of the current infrastructure -a technology assessment and IT infrastructure review

24. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy • The current application portfolio includes centralized, distributed and end user systems and databases. They may be categorized and assessed in a number of ways that represent their value to the organization and their impact on the business. Typical deliverables from a portfolio assesment are given below. • Categorization of the application portfolio : strategic, high potential,key operational, support • Assessment of the contribution of systems to business needs and major opportunities to increase business value

25. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy • Assessment of the effectiveness, unrealized potential in current systems and the enhancement required to increase contribution • Common elements and differences between current portfolio and required systems • Opportunities that exist to improve quality of information • Strengths and weakness assessed against the business CSFs • Assessment of the risks of failure from the current portfolio

26. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy • The assessment work involves collecting a substantial amount ofe information from -the users of the systems and databases -the IS development and IS/IT technical staff • The information may be collected by interview or by questionnaire or by a mixture of both. A questionnaire may be the practical method because there are often multiple users for major business systems.

27. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy • Typical questions that may be asked in an questionnaire are given below: -What busines activities are contained within the system? -What information flows through the system ? -Does the system support a critical business ? -What problems, gaps, poor links, duplications are revealed -Are there any better ways of using the system ? -How flexible is the system for making changes ?

28. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy • The following factors will need assessing for their suitability: -The IS/IT organisation, its size, structure and relationship with the business -How IT is managed and the level at which it reports into -The decision making processes and any steering committee structure in place -End user computing activities and the role and status of an information centre if present

29. The Main Constituents of a Business Strategy • Hardware, software inventories, human resources and their skills are the assets of the organization. The have to be assessed in detailed manner and must be reviewed for their relevance for meeting the future requirements. • Methods in use for business and system analysis, system development, project management, quality assurance may include any structured methodologies, object oriented methods, system development life cycle standards, use of CASE, 4th generation languages, prototyping, decision support, expert systems. It also covers training and education methods.

30. What Does the Business Think of IS ? • It is advantageous to obtain an objective view of role and contribution of IS/IT in the business and within the IS department itself and of the perception of the function from the rest of the business. An objective and qualitative perspective can be drawn by: -Analyzing the current application porfolio . The analysis study can used to categorize the portfolio -Considering the number of business functions which are underpinned by systems.

31. What Does the Business Think of IS ? -Assessment of levels of users satisfaction -User involvement in managing projects and in developing business cases together with the IS/IT group. -The level of integration achieved between systems and technologies -Analysis of the role and the structure of the IS function in relation to the structure of the organisation.

32. External IS/IT Environment • The external IS/IT environment is a perspective on technical trends an opportunities for using IS/IT in innovative ways. The policy of the organization may be to find ways of using existing technology at lower cost. The company policy may be not to be a pioneer of any technology in its own business sector, but to follow at measured pace behind the leaders.

33. Strategic Information Systems Planning Methodologies • Strategic information systems planning is a major change for organizations, from planning for information systems based on users’ demands to those based on business strategy. • The time horizon for planning changes from 1 year to 3 years or more and development plans are driven by current and future business needs rather than incremental user needs.

34. Strategic Information Systems Planning Methodologies • Increase in the time horizon is a factor which results in poor response from the top management to the strategic information systems planning process as it is difficult to hold their attention for such a long period. • Because of the complexity of the strategic information systems planning process and uniqueness of each organization, there is no one best way to tackle it.

35. Strategic Information Systems Planning Methodologies • Strategic information systems planning is a major change for organizations, from planning for information systems based on users’ demands to those based on business strategy. • SISP methodologies are classified into two categories: impact and alignment.

36. Strategic Information Systems Planning Methodologies

37. Impact Methodologies • ‘every firm is a collection of activities that are performed to design, produce, market, deliver, and support its product. All these activities can be represented using a value chain.’ • Information technology is one of the major support activities for the value chain.

38. Impact Methodologies

39. Impact Methodologies(Value Chain Analysis) • Value Chain Analysis: • is a form of business activity analysis which decomposes an enterprise into its parts • helps in devising information systems which increase the overall profit available to a firm. • helps in identifying the potential for mutual business advantages of component businesses, in the same or related industries, • concentrates on value-adding business activities and is independent of organizational structure.

40. Impact Methodologies(Value Chain Analysis) • The main strength of value chain analysis is that it concentrates on direct value adding activities of a firm • But, the basic concept of a value chain is difficult to apply to non-manufacturing organizations where the product is not tangible and there are no obvious raw materials.

41. Impact Methodologies(Critical Success Factor Analysis) • Critical success factors analysis can be considered to be both an impact as well as an alignment methodology. • Critical Success Factorsare used for interpreting the objectives, and operational activities in terms of key information needs of an organization and its managers and strengths and weaknesses of the organization’s existing systems.

42. Impact Methodologies(Critical Success Factor Analysis) • critical success factors are areas of activity that should receive constant and careful attention from management. The CSF approach was originally developed as a means to understanding the information needs of CEOs. • CSFs can exist at a number of levels, i.e., industry, organizational, business unit, or manager’s. CSFs at a lower level are derived from those at the preceding higher level.

43. Impact Methodologies(Critical Success Factor Analysis)

44. Impact Methodologies(Critical Success Factor Analysis) • CSF analysis provides a very powerful method for concentrating on key information requirements of an organization, a business unit, or of a manager. This allows the management to concentrate resources on developing information systems around these requirements. • although CSF analysis is a useful and widely used technique, CSF analysis by itself is not enough to perform comprehensive SISP - it does not define a data architecture

45. Strategic Planning Methodologies Business Systems Planning (BSP):This methodology, developed by IBM, combines top down planning with bottom up implementation. The methodology focuses on business processes which in turn are derived from an organization’s business mission, objectives and goals. • Business processes are analyzed to determine data needs and, then, data classes. Similar data classes are combined to develop databases. The final BSP plan describes an overall information systems architecture.

47. Strategic Planning Methodologies Business Systems Planning (BSP): • http://www.research.ibm.com/journal/sj/211/ibmsj2101E.pdf

48. Strategic Planning Methodologies Business Systems Planning (BSP):

49. Strategic Planning Methodologies Business Systems Planning (BSP):

50. Strategic Planning Methodologies Business Systems Planning (BSP): • http://www.research.ibm.com/journal/sj/211/ibmsj2101E.pdf